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Engelbert Broda

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Engelbert Broda
Born(1910-08-29)August 29, 1910
Vienna, Austria-Hungary
DiedOctober 26, 1983(1983-10-26) (aged 73)
Hainburg an der Donau, Lower Austria, Austria
NationalityAustrian
Other namesERIC
Citizenship Austria
EducationUniversity of Vienna
Known forSoviet program of nuclear weapons
Scientific career
FieldsChemistry
InstitutionsUniversity of Vienna
Cavendish Laboratory
University College London
ThesisStudien zum viskosimetrischen und osmotischen Verhalten der Hochpolymeren in Lösung (1938)
Doctoral advisorHerman Francis Mark

Engelbert Broda (29 August 1910, in Vienna – 26 October 1983) was an Austrian chemist and a suspected Soviet KGB operative with a codenamed: Eric, who could have been a main Russian source on the American-led Manhattan Project on the British side that may have accelerated and advanced the Soviet program of nuclear weapons.[1][2][3][4]

Early life

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Broda was born in Vienna on 29 August 1910 as the first son of Ernst and Viola Broda.: 95  His father, Ernst, a lawyer; his mother was a housewife.: 95 [5] His younger brother Christian Broda was a lawyer who later to become politician to served as a Minister of Justice in Austria. Broda was strongly influenced by his uncle Georg Wilhelm Pabst, a famous film director, and Egon Schönhof, who returned to Austria as a convinced communist after serving time as a prisoner-of-war in Russia.

Broda attended the University of Vienna to study Chemistry where he received his BS in chemistry in 1934, and followed by his PhD in Chemistry in 1938 under Herman Francis Mark.: 95  During his university years, he was a political activist and took participation for communist cause against the Nazi Party influence. During that period, he was imprisoned several times but eventually Broda emigrated to the United Kingdom in 1938.: 95 

Scientific career

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After moving to the United Kingdom in 1938, Broda settled in England and was post-doctoral researcher at the University College London where he investigated the transformations of Light in chemical energy at the Medical Research Council on behalf of the University College London.: 95  In 1941, Broda was a staff scientist at the Cavendish Laboratory of the University of Cambridge where he investigated on the radioactivity, electronegativity, and structure of atoms that are studied mostly as a field of Actinide chemistry, a sub-branch of nuclear chemistry.: 95 

In 1947, Broda returned to the University of Vienna as a faculty member and taught courses on the physical and radiochemistry until 1980. His major work as a scientist - Evolution of the Bioenergetic Processes - was published in 1975.: 95 [5]

Political initiatives and espionage controversy

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Main articles: Atomic spies and Russian espionage in the United Kingdom

Broda became a member of the Pugwash Movement, in support of nuclear disarmament in 1947. He also worked to propagate the use of solar energy, and in 1979 he was awarded the Austrian Award for the Protection of Nature, for his initiatives concerning a projected power plant in Dürnstein, Wachau.[3] He was given an honorary funeral at the Zentralfriedhof in Vienna.

In spite of his anti-nuclear weapons stance, Broda has been accused of being an alleged spy and a resource of providing classified information passed from the British contribution to the American-led Manhattan Project that greatly aided the Soviet program of nuclear weapons. In 2019, Alexander Vassiliev, the Austrian-British journalist, accused Broda of conducting an espionage for the Soviet Union during his research time in the Cavendish Laboratory in England in a book based upon the evidences formerly undisclosed KGB archives.[6]

According to the book, the Soviet KGB reports from August 1943 suggest that Broda— codenamed: "ERIC"— was the main Russian source of information on the British side of the American-led Manhattan project at the earliest times.[2] Broda was known to the British MI5 which had long suspected that he was Alan May's recruiter, but the British prosecutors did not had the conclusive proofs to charge him.[7]

Works

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  • Kräfte des Weltalls (Forces of the universe), Globus, Vienna 1954 (an introduction for non-specialists about phenomenons of astronomy, radiation, palaeogeography, raw materials, the basic structures of chemical substances, and fundamental principles of life)
  • Ludwig Boltzmann. Mensch, Physiker, Philosoph, 1955
  • Atomkraft - Furcht und Hoffnung, 1956
  • The Evolution of the Bioenergetic Processes, 1975 [8]
  • Wissenschaft, Verantwortung, Frieden, 1985

References

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  1. ^ Archives, The National. "BRODA: Austrian. A scientist,". discovery.nationalarchives.gov.uk. Retrieved 8 December 2024.
  2. ^ a b Leonard Doyle (10 May 2009), "New spy book names Engelbert Broda as KGB atomic spy in Britain", Daily Telegraph
  3. ^ a b Ben Macintyre (10 June 2009), "The spy who started the Cold War", The Times
  4. ^ John Earl Haynes; Harvey Klehr; Alexander Vassiliev (2010). Spies: The Rise and Fall of the KGB in America. Yale University Press. ISBN 978-0-300-15572-3.
  5. ^ a b Vierhaus, Rudolf (3 May 2011). Brann - Einslin (in German). Walter de Gruyter. ISBN 978-3-11-094656-7. Retrieved 8 December 2024.
  6. ^ ISBN 978-0-300-12390-6 Copyright 2009 John Earl Haynes, Harvey Klehr and Alexander Vassiliew
  7. ^ MI5 Website - Engelbert Broda
  8. ^ Katalogzettel Universitätsbibliothek Wien

Further reading

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  • "Spies, the Rise and Fall of the KGB in America" ISBN 978-0-300-12390-6, John Earl Haynes, Harvey Klehr and Alexander Vassiliew
  • Scientist Spies by Paul Broda (2011)
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